chapter 51 - psychotherapy

Before they started shooting for the film, Xie Ning went to look for Ji WenBin again.

He was now able to calmly face the psychiatrist Ji Wenbin, and was able to casually take a look at his surroundings when he visited.

The four walls were painted white, but although the white was clear and bright, it still gave others a sort of sickly feeling.

Ji WenBin stuck wallpaper on it instead, a soft yellow color, which made people brighten up as they looked at it.

The interior design was also comfortable. The furniture was spaced out not too far and not too closely. Even patients with OCD wouldn’t feel uncomfortable here.

The sofa’s texture was soft, and as soon as someone sits on it, their body sinks into the soft cloth and they relax.

Shortly after Xie Ning sat down, Ji WenBin offered him a glass of water as usual.

“Thank you.” Xie Ning smiled at him.

Ji WenBin looked at him.

His gaze was very gentle, perhaps because he’d seen many patients who were sensitive to stares. Even if he was staging, his gaze didn’t give others a sense of abnormality.

Xie Ning’s aura seemed quite good, unlike the past couple of times, when even his gaze towards Ji WenBin was obviously guarded.

He sat in a relaxed position, and his expression was very natural. Compared to his initial stiff, and pale appearance, it seemed like he was two different people.

Ji WenBin thought, besides his own credit, Zhuang Yan’s support from behind the scenes was also very important.

He sat across from Xie Ning and smiled.

Xie Ning had to admit that talking to Ji WenBin was something that could relax him both mentally and physically. At least, Ji WenBin shattered his impression of a psychiatrist.

But Xie Ning was still a little uneasy in his heart, and was afraid that Ji WenBin would rip away the peaceful illusion.

The shadow he attributed to psychiatrists was really too heavy.

Perhaps because Ji WenBin knew about Xie Ning’s defenses, he chatted with him casually about trivial matters until he was completely relaxed before occasionally testing the waters.

“Last time, you said you had symptoms of insomnia. How is it now?”

Did I mention insomnia last time?

This thought flashed across Xie Ning’s mind, but he replied, without thinking too much, “It’s much better.”

When he was at Ji WenBin’s place, it seemed like he’d said one or two things about everything already. Ji WenBin wouldn’t really turn the conversation towards his condition or deliberately try to explore his past.

The two of them were like friends who had scheduled afternoon tea, sitting on the sofa and chatting endlessly until time passed unknowingly, the whole afternoon slipping by their fingertips.

Later on, Xie Ning recalled that he didn’t really remember what he said but his mood always improved a lot.

Ji WenBin said, “Although sleeping pills are effective, I don’t recommend them for long-time use.”

Xie Ning shook his head. “I haven’t taken much medicine recently.”

Ji WenBin let out an “Oh”, like he was surprised. “So can you fall asleep yourself without the medicine?”

Xie Ning hesitated for a moment and nodded.

But if he were to really talk about it, it wasn’t all because of his own effort.

It was probably because one night, when he was suffering from insomnia and walked out of the art studio, he bumped into Zhuang Yan, who got up in the middle of the night.

Zhuang Yan went downstairs to get some water, and there was a faint night light in the corridor from which Xie Ning could see the gloomy expression on his face.

He was obviously not very happy.

“Not sleeping in the middle of the night?”

Xie Ning smiled at him, looking a bit awkward.

He quickly looked for an excuse, but even after his mind went in a circle, he still couldn’t find a reasonable excuse for why he went to the art studio in the middle of the night.

So he obediently apologized. “I was wrong.”

Zhuang Yan was still holding the water glass, and the light lit up only one half of his face. The expression on the other half of his face, in the dark, wasn’t so clear.

Xie Ning faintly heard him sigh, but suspected that he was having auditory hallucinations.

He wasn’t very comfortable at the time, and his insomnia came hand in hand with bouts of dull head pain, as if there was a hammer banging inside.

So his reactions were a bit slow.

When Zhuang Yan took him back to his room, he was still in a daze.

Looking at Zhuang Yan’s unhappy expression, Xie Ning obediently climbed onto his bed.

It wasn’t that he wasn’t sleepy, but every time he closed his eyes, his head would start to ache, which made falling asleep a very luxurious thing.

The lights in the room were all turned off.

Xie Ning heard something being placed onto the table in the dark. He thought slowly and remembered that it was probably Zhuang Yan’s water glass.

He was a little curious as to how Zhuang Yan could find the table so accurately in the dark.

Zhang Yan then miraculously walked to the side of the bed and felt Xie Ning’s head. He asked, “Headache?”

Xie Ning nodded, then was afraid that Zhuang Yan wouldn’t be able to see, and said, “A little.”

Zhuang Yan’s hands rubbed his temples a couple times.

His hands were wide and heavy, but the strength of his kneading was light and slow. “I’m not very experienced, so just bear with it for a little.”

This was probably the first time in Director Zhuang’s entire life that he’d served someone else, and he stumbled over his actions a bit, but Xie Ning miraculously felt like his head didn’t hurt anymore.

After a while, Zhuang Yan’s movements stopped and he withdrew his hands.

Xie Ning thought he was about to leave, and opened his eyes.

In the darkness, he could only distinguish Zhuang Yan’s faint outline.

His features were solid and striking and his shoulders were broad, so from any angle he was a very, very attractive man.

Xie Ning looked at him for a while and realized that the outline suddenly closed in.

Right afterwards, Zhuang Yan turned around and climbed onto the bed, hugging Xie Ning in his arms.

Surrounded by Zhuang Yan’s breath, Xie Ning moved a little subconsciously.

Zhuang Yan pressed his hands and feet down and hugged him tighter. He said in a low voice, “Don’t fuss.”

His tone sounded like he was coaxing a child.

Zhuang Yan probably took a shower before bed because the smell of his body was very clean, with only the faint smell of body wash, and didn’t have the smell of that perfume that made Xie Ning’s legs go soft.

The two of them used the same brand of body wash, and the fragrance was similar. Xie Ning didn’t feel uncomfortable when smelling it.

But when he thought about the warm body that he was so close to, Xie Ning couldn’t help but feel dizzy. If the moonlight could spill past the curtains, he was afraid that it would be able to show the slightly red corners of his eyes.

Now, Xie Ning’s headache and sleeplessness were abandoned to the back of his mind.

He was disconcerted for a while, and obediently shrank within Zhuang Yan’s arms. He asked, “You...you aren’t going back?”

Zhuang Yan responded quietly, “I’ll go back later.”

Xie Ning wanted to ask more, but Zhuang Yan said, “I’m afraid you’ll run outside of the room in the middle of the night again, so I’ll go back when you’ve fallen asleep.”

“...” Xie Ning tried to bluff his way out. “I won’t go around recklessly.”

Zhuang Yan chuckled. “Do you think you have any credibility with me anymore?”

Wait.

Xie Ning was a little confused. What did he do for him to lose all his credibility all of a sudden?

But before he could object, Zhuang Yan had already reached over for the blanket and wrapped him in it tightly, from head to toe. Only Xie Ning’s head and his blinking eyes were exposed.

“Stop talking and sleep, quickly.” Zhuang Yan’s voice was low. “You think I can’t handle you?”

Xie Ning obediently closed his eyes.

He thought that it would take a long while before he would be able to sleep.

But when he leaned on Zhuang Yan’s chest and closed his eyes, not long afterwards, a sense of fatigue flooded over him.

In the end, he didn’t remember when he fell asleep. When he woke up, Zhuang Yan had left a long time ago, and only the blue whale plushie stared at him motionlessly from the side of the bed.

Xie Ning suspected that everything that happened last night was a dream.

Until he finished brushing his teeth and washing his face, when he saw the water glass on the table.

It was still half full.

After that day, Zhuang Yan would stay in his room at night for a while, saying that he wanted to see him fall asleep before leaving.

Xie Ning protested a couple times, but Zhuang Yan still won.

Later on, Xie Ning vaguely understood that Zhuang Yan roughly knew about his insomnia and wanted to use this method to help him.

He had to say that it was quite effective.

……

“Zhuang Yan, asking you to meet me once is somehow even harder than climbing to the sky.”

Zhuang Yan wasn’t happy that he was brought to this private club, and he had a long face.

But he truly hadn’t met up with Qi Rui in a while. Qi Rui teased him a few times, saying that he was “neglecting his friends when he found a new love”, but Zhuang Yan always responded without a change in expression.

Since Xie Ning was going to see Ji WenBin today, Zhuang Yan took some time out of his day to meet with Qi Rui. “I’ve been so busy recently that my feet don’t even touch the ground.”

Qi Rui smiled. “No matter how busy you are, you should still have the time to meet up, right? I heard that you’ve been so punctual to return home to eat dinner even if thunder struck you.”

Zhuang Yan raised his eyebrows. “I think you can be a little more accurate with your words. I’m not eating dinner, I’m making dinner.”

“...” Qi Rui said, “I don’t know when you became such a good wife and loving mother.”

Zhuang Yan looked at him with disdain. “What kind of description is that? If you didn’t learn Chinese well enough, I suggest you find a tutor.”

The club wasn’t as lively during the day as it was at night. If it wasn’t for the fact that it was impossible to pull Zhuang Yan out at night, Qi Rui wouldn’t have settled for this timing.

Even though he did manage to meet Zhuang Yan, he felt like it was really boring. He could only pour two glasses of wine and casually clink glasses with Zhuang Yan.

Zhuang Yan took two sips, then lowered his head to fiddle with his phone.

Qi Rui looked over curiously and found that Zhuang Yan was still playing the mobile rabbit game.

“It’s rare to see you play a game for so long.” Qi Rui asked, “You’ve played it for so long now and you’re still not sick of it?”

He also downloaded and played the game, and just like Zhuang Yan thought, Qi Rui deleted it after 10 minutes.

Zhuang Yan said, “I actually haven’t opened it in a long time too, but I don’t have anything to do right now.”

There’s a real Mr. Rabbit waiting for him to raise, so there was no need for him to play a game.

Qi Rui wasn’t interested in watching him play such a boring game, so he leaned on the counter and drank some wine. He really did start to get drunk.

In his slight drunkenness, he remembered something and poked Zhuang Yan’s elbow.

Zhuang Yan furrowed his brow and changed his sitting position, then raised his head to look at him. “What’s the matter?”

Qi Rui said, “Last time, didn’t you ask me to investigate Xie Ning and Xu Qing’s past?”

Zhuang Yan already knew about the matters between the two of them, so he wasn’t really interested in it right now. He casually made a sound and said, “I don’t remember, was there something like that?”

Qi Rui suddenly jumped up. “Of course there was!”

He gave Zhuang Yan a fright, and Zhuang Yan accidentally pressed the wrong button on the screen. He rubbed his forehead and said, “Okay, okay, okay, then there was such a thing. What did you find out?”

Qi Rui suddenly gave up. “I didn’t find anything useful.”

Zhuang Yan wasn’t really surprised.

There wasn’t a real relationship between the two in the first place.

“However, the people I found to do this job felt like it was embarrassing to not find anything, so they went to investigate Xie Ning instead.”

Seeing Zhuang Yan’s fierce gaze on him, Qi Rui hurriedly explained, “I’ve told you before that I use legal methods.”

Zhuang Yan locked his phone screen and asked, “What did they find?”

“I don’t know if it counts as having found something,” Qi Rui said, “but I think it’s something you’d want to know.”

Zhuang Yan glanced at him impatiently. “Say it.”

Qi Rui took another sip of wine to wet his throat and said, “Xie Ning seems to have met with a lot of psychological counselors in the past.”

Zhuang Yan paused, and his expression became imposing. “When did this happen?”

“Pretty early on.” Qi Rui said, “The investigators said they asked their colleagues all the way in the south, so it was probably before Xie Ning became an adult.”

Before adulthood…

Zhuang Yan’s lips turned into a straight line.

“Did he go to them himself?”

Qi Rui shook his head. “This is what I was going to talk about. His mother, Xia Wan, used a lot of connections to find these psychological counselors. At first, I didn’t think anything was wrong, since he’s the only son and psychologically, he should be taken care of.”

Zhuang Yan asked, “So what’s wrong?”

Qi Rui replied, “Afterwards, the investigators told me that those psychological counselors weren’t very...according to standard.”

Zhuang Yan furrowed his brow and repeated, “Not according to standard?”

“Yes.” Qi Rui shrugged. “In the early years of psychology, there really were a lot of problems with psychologists. Later on, the country even got rid of the qualification exam for psychologists, so some private training institutions made some sort of ACI exam, but there wasn’t really much of a practical effect. Basically, there are a lot of people in the field that aren’t qualified to be psychologists who fish in troubled waters.”

Zhuang Yan, in disbelief, said, “Why couldn’t Xia Wan find one that was up to standard?”

Qi Rui frowned. “I found it weird too, so I asked them to check if Xia Wan was tricked, but I didn’t expect that those psychological counselors were unprofessional to such a degree--I spent a little money and was able to buy Xie Ning’s medical records from them.”

Zhuang Yan was shocked. “What did you say?”

“Don’t stare at me like that.” Qi Rui avoided his gaze. “Afterwards, when I looked at the medical records, I understood. Xia Wan wasn’t able to find a proper psychologist at all because she was looking for someone to treat Xie Ning for...homosexuality.”

Zhuang Yan almost crushed the glass in his hand.

……

“It’s a pleasure to chat with you, Dr. Ji.” Xie Ning took a sip of water and finished it till the bottom.

Ji WenBin smiled, raised the kettle, and slowly poured some more water for him.

This time, he didn’t fill it all the way, as if they couldn’t talk for too long.

Xie Ning said, “You’re the first psychiatrist to tell me confidently that I’m not sick.”

“Of course you’re not sick.” Ji WenBin said.

“In 1990, the World Health Organization officially removed homosexuality from the list of illnesses; 1997, in the new 《Penal Code》, the crime of hooliganism was removed; in 2001, the Chinese Psychiatric Association removed homosexuality from the category of mental illnesses...until now, same-sex marriage has been legal for several years as well.”

He said, “Xie Ning, you’ve never been sick.”

Xie Ning’s eyelashes trembled.